Do what thou whilt shall be the whole of the Law.
I wrote a massive blog post about it when it first happened and it’s still pinned to the top of the feed on the homepage at the time of this writing and will remain until the danger has passed or there’s new information on the subject to update about. It pretty much covers everything there is to know about it but I felt like it was worth reiterating and expanding on various aspects a little further.
Firstly, it’s not too late to fight back and prevent it from going into effect. Right now it has not gone into effect yet and is open for comments. There’s another post with the relevant information on the situation and how to voice your opposition to it. I was given it from TransOhio when I reached out to them about it. I highly encourage you to voice your opposition to it ASAP. If enough people write in maybe they’ll reverse it or something. We can only hope.
Please send my main topical blog post to everyone you know to get the word out.
I think a lot of people are not doing anything who might otherwise be because because the GOP-slime managed to slip it through under everyone’s noses. They had sent up that transphobic bill taking away youth trans care that DeWine veto’d, then right after that he made this executive order that’s way worse than the bill even was, and it effects adults too, not just youth. I’m pretty sure he did that on purpose as a red hearing, to distract from the executive order. Worse, it seems to have worked, unfortunately. I could only find one news agency that was even talking about it when it happened and it was a small new outlet. None of the big dogs ever published anything on it that I’m aware of. A lot of what little else there was, was just dismissing it as having been vetoed, but that was the bill, not the executive order. Additionally they kept calling it an “administrative rule” rather than “executive order” which I imagine was to further obfuscate it from the masses and keep it from coming to people’s attention.
The vote in the recent election on reproductive rights and weed legalization has proved the state is more blue than it might outwardly appear, but the GOP controlled government isn’t playing fair. They don’t care about being an actual representation of their constituents. They just want to push their regressive agenda through no matter what anyone thinks of it and without regard to the harm it will do. They work to actively keep the people from actually being truly represented. They’ve gerrymandered the hell out of the state to the point that it’s extremely difficult to outright impossible for a Democrat to get elected in so many of the districts. It’s not unlike the Republican infestation situation Texas is famous for. Republicans know they can’t get elected on equal footing because nobody actually believes them anymore but those completely off their rocker. So instead of just having a fair and free election and letting the people decide, they’d rather hold power however they can without regard to anyone. Not only is gerrymandering a huge issue (and one both parties exploit to some degree) but also we see voter suppression in the GOP almost constantly. Pushing for unconstitutional things like voter ID checks and other measures to keep as many people from voting as they can. They know they’re actually the minority and that the majority of their supporters are on the older side. They have nothing better to do on election day and can afford pushing through standing in line in the middle of the day to vote, but not everyone can. A lot of people are stuck at work, busy caring for their kids, or any number of other things of the like. They can’t always afford to go spend an hour in a line just to tick a box. It’s frustrating this still hasn’t been addressed. What we need is to make election day a federal holiday and one with requirements for employers who insist on keeping people on even when it is a holiday to let employees go vote. They deserve to have their voices heard and their votes cast as much as anyone. It’s only fair to give them this. Granted there’s always early voting methods but they don’t exactly make it easy to navigate.
The Ohio legislature is a perfect example of how just how poor actual representation is in this state. It’s so majority Republican that they were able to force the afformentioned youth-focused anti-trans bill through into law anyway, despite the veto. It’s a bill turned law that’s seriously fucked up and going to cause a lot of otherwise preventable deaths. Gender dysphoria, when left untreated, is extremely often fatal. The only treatment that has ever worked to curtail the painful symptoms of gender dysphoria is transition and the quicker the care can start, the better. It’s absolutely essential to get on HRT and the other relevant treatments ASAP when you have it for the prevention of fatality at the hands of the severity of the symptoms. I myself, despite everything, still get passive suicidal thoughts* when my dysphoria level rises. Lately it has been centered on treatment I can’t currently have but desperately need. I am currently being denied certain treatments for largely arbitrary reasons. It’s frustrating and unpleasant to say the least. Having to jump through excessive and needless hoops to get access to long established medically necessary treatment that’s been proven effective for almost a century to resolve a medical issue is absolutely absurd, extremely harmful and downright disgusting. Can you imagine needing a “team” of medical professionals to diagnose you and give you treatment for diabetes? No. Of course not, because that would be absurd. It’s just as absurd in this situation when it comes to gender dysphoria as diabetes. Yet DeWine thinks this is a reasonable requirement to get access to appropriate medical care.
Gender dysphoria is as real and physical a sensation as pain or hunger. Despite this, people want to act like it’s just confusion on our part. Hon, I can assure you it’s not confusion. I’ve known since I was at least 6 years old, maybe earlier. We know who we are and who we’re supposed to be and that’s something only we as individuals can know for certain. It’s our true will. It’s personal; an experience completely unable to be shared. No matter how many hoops, hours of therapy, talks with a psychiatrist, etc you put in our way, we will always know who we are and will not budge on that. That is a fact that has been well established by our history and you’d know that if you ever studied it. Unless there is a direct concern for our safety, we’re forced to go into hiding, or something along those lines, we’re going to continue to seek treatment and demand the right to embody our true selves, even perhaps to the death.
We’ve been this way from birth and no matter what transphobic lies you spread or abusive and ineffective “treatments” you put us through (like so-called “conversation therapy”), it will never change that. We know it is in line with our true will on a visceral level. We know our bodies and what they’re supposed to be. Who are you to presume you could ever know us more than we know ourselves? Fool. We know our dysphoria and it’s as real and physical as anything else. Simply knowing it internally isn’t ever enough to curb the dysphoria and I can’t stress it enough that gender dysphoria needs to be treated with great expediency to prevent a fatal outcome. There’s nothing else to know or do about that. Absolutely no other treatment methods but transition have ever shown to be the least bit effective at fighting gender dysphoria than transition despite excessive and harmful trials and experiments often leading to the death of patients.
The idea that you can pray the trans away is patently absurd. That’s not how reality works. This reality being as it is, is just as true with trans people as it is with type 1 diabetes. To think otherwise is, simply put, foolish and ignorant.
These are fools that men adore; both their Gods & their men are fools. Liber CCXX I:11.
We are who we are and you can either accept that and be our allies fighting back against the onslaught, or you can get the hell out of the way. ‘Cause either way, we’re going to push back. With the changing of the æon we’re currently in we’ve grown and are here to stay no matter what you do, what you say, what you believe, or how you behave. We are here and there’s nothing you can do about it. We always have been despite the best efforts of our enemies to eliminate us. We will always be here like it or not. Even in ancient Sumer we were there. Even as we lived and sang our laments in the Temple of Inanna, the earliest records known to man, those written by the ones who invented writing, our lives and rights were recorded as ever.
To turn a man into a woman and a woman into a man are yours, Inana. ETCSLtranslation : t.4.07.3 120
All you’re doing if you stand in our way is delaying the inevitable, and you’ll find a lot of collateral damage and innocent blood on your hands that will never wash away. So instead of choosing violence of any form, why not choose love instead? Be better; walk with love and compassion. United as one people we are much stronger than we are divided.
There is no bond that can unite the divided but love: all else is a curse. Accurséd! Accurséd be it to the aeons! Hell. Liber CCXX I:41
Love is the law, love under will.
With righteous indignation,
Vanessa
*None with any active danger of being followed through on though. My SSRIs and existing treatments are working for that aspect at least, so no need to worry.